Geoffrey Clifton-Brown MP

The Daily Mail this morning reports on the 118 Conservative MPs who have written to constituents indicating their opposition to gay marriage proposals. The Mail says "Their opposition has been expressed in letters and emails sent to constituents who have contacted them with their own concerns", and points out that if these MPs voted against proposals, it would constitute the biggest Tory rebellion in modern times. However, Equalities Minister (and Secretary of State for Culture) Maria Miller pointed out on Twitter that since any vote on the issue would be a free vote, it would not technically be counted as a rebellion.

I have listed the MPs from the Mail's story below.

Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty)

Peter Aldous (Waveney)

Tony Baldry (Banbury)

Guto Bebb (Aberconwy)

Henry Bellingham (North West Norfolk)

Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley)

Jake Berry (Rossendale and Darwen)

Andrew Bingham (High Peak)

Brian Binley (Northampton South)

Bob Blackman (Harrow East)

Nicola Blackwood (Oxford West and Abingdon)

Peter Bone (Wellingborough)

Graham Brady (Altrincham and Sale West)

Julian Brazier (Canterbury)

Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire)

Steve Brine (Winchester)

Fiona Bruce (Congleton)

Robert Buckland (South Swindon)

Conor Burns (Bournemouth West)*

Simon Burns (Chelmsford)

David Burrowes (Enfield Southgate)

Alun Cairns (Vale of Glamorgan)

Douglas Carswell (Clacton)

William Cash (Stone)

Rehman Chishti (Gillingham and Rainham)

Christopher Chope (Christchurch)

Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds)

Therese Coffey (Suffolk Coastal)

Geoffrey Cox (Torridge and West Devon)

Stephen Crabb (Preseli Pembrokeshire)

David Davies (Monmouth)

Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire)

Philip Davies (Shipley)

David Davis (Haltemprice and Howden)

Nick de Bois (Enfield North)

Caroline Dinenage (Gosport)

Richard Drax (South Dorset)

Charlie Elphicke (Dover)

Jonathan Evans (Cardiff North)

David Evennett (Bexleyheath and Crayford)

George Freeman (Mid Norfolk)

Richard Fuller (Bedford)

Roger Gale (North Thanet)

Edward Garnier (Harborough)

John Glen (Salisbury)

Cheryl Gillan (Chesham and Amersham)

Robert Goodwill (Scarborough and Whitby)

Robert Halfon (Harlow)

Philip Hammond (Runnymede and Weybridge)

John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings)

Gordon Henderson (Sittingbourne and Sheppey)

George Hollingbery (Meon Valley)

Philip Hollobone (Kettering)

Adam Holloway (Gravesham)

Gerald Howarth (Aldershot)

Stewart Jackson (Peterborough)

Gareth Johnson (Dartford)

David Jones (Clwyd West)

Marcus Jones (Nuneaton)

Eleanor Laing (Epping Forest)

Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire)

Andrea Leadsom (South Northamptonshire)

Philip Lee (Bracknell)

Jeremy Lefroy (Stafford)

Edward Leigh (Gainsborough)

Julian Lewis (New Forest East)

Ian Liddell-Grainger (Bridgwater and West Somerset)

Peter Lilley (Hitchen and Harpenden)

Jonathan Lord (Woking)

Tim Loughton (East Worthing and Shoreham)

Anne Main (St Albans)

Paul Maynard (Blackpool North and Cleveleys)

Anne-Marie Morris (Newton Abbot)

Karl McCartney (Lincoln)

Anne McIntosh (Thirsk and Malton)

Stephen McPartland (Stevenage)

Esther McVey (Wirral West)

Steve Metcalfe (South Basildon and East Thurrock)

Nicky Morgan (Loughborough)

David Nuttall (Bury North)

Matthew Offord (Hendon)

Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton)

Priti Patel (Witham)

Owen Paterson (North Shropshire)

Mark Pawsey (Rugby)

Mike Penning (Hemel Hempstead)

Christopher Pincher (Tamworth)

Mark Pritchard (The Wrekin)

John Redwood (Wokingham)

Jacob Rees-Mogg (North East Somerset)

Simon Reevell (Dewsbury)

Andrew Robathan (South Leicestershire)

Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury)

Andrew Rosindell (Romford)

David Ruffley (Bury St Edmunds)

David Rutley (Macclesfield)

Andrew Selous (South West Bedfordshire)

Alec Shelbrooke (Elmet and Rothwell)

Richard Shepherd (Aldridge-Brownhills)

Henry Smith (Crawley)

John Stevenson (Carlisle)

Bob Stewart (Beckenham)

Gary Streeter (South West Devon)

Mel Stride (Central Devon)

Robert Syms (Poole)

David Tredinnick (Bosworth)

Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight)

Andrew Tyrie (Chichester)

Paul Uppal (Wolverhampton South West)

Martin Vickers (Cleethorpes)

Ben Wallace (Wyre and Preston North)

Robert Walter (North Dorset)

James Wharton (Stockton South)

Craig Whittaker (Calder Valley)

John Whittingdale (Maldon)

Bill Wiggin (North Herefordshire)

Gavin Williamson (South Staffordshire)

Jeremy Wright (Kenilworth and Southam)

* Conor Burns has stated that he will not be voting against gay marriage but may abstain.

One of Grant Shapps' first acts as the new Tory Chairman has been to ask for the election countdown clock to be put back on the wall of Conservative HQ. Meeting him yesterday afternoon he told me that there were less than 1,000 days until the next general election (969 actually if its 7th May 2015) and the party machine needed to start getting into battle mode.

Yesterday he announced the team that he hopes will help the party deliver victory for David Cameron. He, Lord Feldman and Mr Cameron made five new appointments:

Sarah Newton MP will be the new Deputy Chairman, replacing Michael Fallon. Expect to see Sarah becoming an important new public face of the Conservative Party. She will be a national spokesperson for the party but the MP for Truro and Falmouth will also be particularly important in the South West where the party faces important contests with the Liberal Democrats. Read Sarah's reaction to her appointment.

Alok Sharma has been appointed as Vice Chairman for responsibility for BME Communities. He is expected to work closely with the PM's new PPS, Sam Gyimah who has been thinking through the party's outreach strategy to ethnic minorities for some time.

Richard Harrington will take on a new role for campaign finance, again as Vice Chairman, looking at how we raise and allocate maximum resources for target seats.

Grant Shapps told ConservativeHome that one of the jobs facing him, Lord Feldman and the new team was to overcome the cynicism that people feel about the tasks currently facing Britain. He suggested that we were in the phase two or three years before the Olympics when people were suspicious about the cost of the Games and wondered whether all of the effort would be worthwhile. It was the whole Conservative Party's task, he said, to use the rest of the parliament to convince people that the road may be hard but the destination of better schools, a benefits system that rewards work and a paying down on the deficit will all be worth it.

The new Tory Chairman will be writing a regular monthly column for ConservativeHome.

PS Can any reader remember the last time that we had a party chairman who has won a seat from Labour?

Last year, the Prime Minister flew to Brussels amidst rumour of a leadership challenge if he didn't achieve at least a token repatriation of power.

Today, he faced the Commons not only with no such repatriation realised but with his veto - so rapturously greeted at the time by Conservative MPs - arguably valueless, since it's now clear that he won't challenge the principle of the EU institutions being used to enforce the F.U agreement.

Yet there was no mass revolt from his backbenches, and no revival to date of the leadership challenge rumours. What explains this change in the Tory atmosphere? I hope to explore the question in detail soon, but will for the moment rest with an answer I've cited before.

At questions to the MP representing the House of Commons Commission (Nick Harvey) yesterday, a succession of Conservative MPs raised issues about the cost of the recently refurbished Bellamy's Bar being turned into a nursery for the children of MPs and House of Commons staff...

Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold): This important issue has not suddenly arisen before the House. I believe that the process so far has been unacceptable and undemocratic. Will the hon. Gentleman confirm that £400,000 has recently been spent on refurbishing Bellamy's bar, and that this proposal will cost an additional £400,000? Will he confirm whether that has been included in the House budget estimates for this financial year?

Nick Harvey: The recent refurbishment in Bellamy's involves a significant amount of work and furnishing that can be reused-certainly about a third of the cost can be used directly. The hon. Gentleman says that this has come about swiftly, but I would point out that there have been constant surveys of the need for child care provision here, and the decision has been taken to move swiftly with this project so that the option is available to new Members as early as possible in the new Parliament to take up this facility if they need it.

Peter Luff (Worcestershire Mid): I entirely share the perception of the need for such a day nursery, but I hope that the hon. Gentleman will agree that the House of Commons should establish any such facility on an exemplary basis. Given that, as on this particular occasion, a nursery cannot comply with statutory guidance to providers, I hope he will search urgently for an alternative site - one that would comply with that guidance.